Guess who's coming to Thanksgiving dinner! A Space Station TaleBy Lisa Williamson Every culture has some type of harvest festival. A time when everyone comes together to give thanks for a bountiful growing season. They are tied to the autumnal seasons planetside but when you are out in the deep dark without a world below, it can be difficult to plan a festival of thanksgiving. When I was a sprattling living back in the Mother world we picked fruit, ate pies and stuffed ourselves with turkey. What is turkey you ask? Well it was a big bird, a fowl that we baked or roasted or fried. We would fill it with stuffing and enjoy a harvest meal. Now I know a lot of you were born on ships or grew up on worlds far from here but as kids we used to look forward to this feast of food that came each year. It was a time when all your far-flung cousins would come and you got to play and talk and celebrate family. Of course we are on a station and when making a feast you have to remember not everyone eats meat. Sure surprised me how many vegans there were out here. No I don't mean those tale green skinned highbrow types, I mean people who won't eat meat. They have no idea what they are missing. A fine juicy drumstick or the moist white breast meat filling up your plate, oh my was it good. Stuffing filled with all kinds of good stuff like apples or cranberries and herbs. My mouth waters just thinking about it. Over the years of running this place I have had to come up with some really out there meals. Each traveler wants that taste of home when they come to celebrate here in the deep dark. I have made yams into a dozen different dishes. Moon cakes of all kinds fill my kitchen and the pasta seems to over flow and that is just for the humans who stop by to eat. Finding a Denebian crawfish thingie to stew up or a Venusian swiggle worm, well it gets interesting. Usually I have to start to bartering months in advance and let me tell you it gets pricey. Made me really glad that we were down to a skeleton crew this year. See being the chief cook and bottle washer along with the head of hydroponics means I get all those requests for a taste of home. I can work what seems like a miracle at times but just once I wanted to put together a meal that was purely from my old, old home. Not too many out here have ever seen Earth, never mind seen the part of the world I came from. Yeah they know what pumpkins are, thanks to my Halloween fun but have they ever had sweet potatoes with mini marshmallows on top? Heck do they even know what a marshmallow is? I can assure you they don't. After last year's disaster I decided that I would close up shop and only feed my family. Yeah so I am not married, don't have kids and certainly don't think the rest of my brothers would make it this far into space but hey I work with these people all the time right? So I started my bargaining and got my special treats together and for once we were really slow. Nothing was due in for at least a week, just me and the rest of the skeleton crew with time on our hands. So I baked and I stuffed, stewed and marinated. Let me tell you keeping the nosey tasters out of my kitchen was a battle. Jimmy from engineering just had to make sure I was cooking up his haggis to his momma's recipe. Tinka wanted her auntie's peach cobbler and well the rest just wanted a taste of the rest. It was both annoying but also so sweet. Reminded me of home in my Nana's kitchen watching her wield that massive wooden spoon of hers. Well it was nearly time for dinner. The turkey was roasting on my special oven and the pies were cooling out of the way of greedy deck hands and I was just turning the loaves into pans when I got a call on the comm unit I keep by the oven. Expecting that it was one of the deck hands begging me for an appetizer I have to admit I wasn't using my Sunday manners as my Nana used to say. Well after a stunned moment or three the voice on the other end surprised me! "Who taught you words like that?" I swear you coulda picked me up off the floor. Never in a dozen years did I expect to be hearing the voice of my baby brother on the other side of that old comm unit. Hell it is only supposed to be able to pick up and broadcast within the station and last I knew he was back taking care of the homestead. Told me that I was a damn fool shipping off into the big dark and all. "Mikey? Is that you?" "Yup its me. Thought I would come visit for a spell." Now you have to understand that Mikey is my little brother, my planet bound little brother. He never could stand being off the ground in anyway. He was like most of my family; throw backs to the oldest way of doing things. Part of why I left old Earth was that I wanted adventure, not to stay down on the farm. How he could be sending me a message on the comm unit was something confusing to me. "Visit? Mikey how on the green hills of Earth do you think you will get here?" "Well you see, that be a surprise, big brother." I could hear the humor in his voice. "See you before dinner!" When I went to interrogate the little monster all I got was dead air. "Before dinner?" I looked about my kitchen. All the food was nearly ready. Dinner was scheduled for 1800 hours and that was only an hour away. How could he be here before dinner? How could he be here? Well I quickly whipped out some more of my family's super secret dishes, decanted the cranberry sauce and ran into hydroponics to pull up the turnips. I personally despise those white roots but little brother loved them. If it wasn't a joke, some odd radio glitch, I dern well better have them on the table for him. After setting them on to boil I bustled up to the Tower. Now no we don't actually have a tower on the station but the command center is always called the tower. The old names are just one of those fun things about space travel. Lucky for me one of my favorite ladies was on watch today. Kerrie is a lovely little thing, all big brown eyes and red curls. At one time we had been more than friends so she always had a smile for me. "Well my favorite chef, what are you doing here?" She was sitting at the comm desk with her feet up, looking like a kid with a secret. "I just got the oddest call on that old unit in my kitchen. I thought it only worked inside the station?" I was pretty sure I was right but you never know in space. Kerrie shrugged and flipped through the old school magazine in her lap. "Been some new parts brought in for that unit. I worked on it just last week, remember?" Well I did not remember that at all but it could be true. I was running myself ragged getting that last ship full of refugees out of the station so I could have missed her in there. "Oh. Okay." I turned, biting my lip and then turned back to her pulling a face. "That don't explain my brother's call. What is the range on that thing?" Kerrie just gave me her cute smile and then turned as static filled the room. That sure sign of incoming comm traffic. I rolled my eyes and left. Yeah I could have bugged her more but something you learn early with Kerrie is not to push your luck. She is the gatekeeper, so to speak, in this place. Everything goes through her boards sooner or later. Heading back down station I stopped and talked to friends along the way. No one had a clue about an incoming ship or if anything was due in. I could have pulled rank and ordered them but it ain't something I do. Yeah I have rank. Other than the stationmaster I have been on this station the longest. Hell to be honest I was here before he was. I fed the crew that built this place back when. So I went back to my kitchen and between simmering and basting tried to figure out what was going on. When I left the farm my family had all thought I was nuts. No McHard had left the land since before the Wall was built. Okay to be truthful there was my great many times grandfather who left the old homeland and moved to the colonies. He started up the second branch of the old clan. I was the first to leave Mother Earth. That urge to go to the star made my family confused. They didn't understand leaving a perfectly good planet to go live on a tin can in space. After a lifetime I never expected to see them again. Dinner was just about ready when one of my busboys came in. Calling Hershel a boy was a bit of a stretch. Ya see his people don't have sexes, not really but what can you expect from a race evolved from Broccoli. Okay something that looks like broccoli. He was a great busboy but keep him away from the salad. I mean it; you don't want to know what he does! Well Hershel told me that the tables were all set and that my guests had arrived. "Guests? What guests?" After pulling the turkey from the oven and putting the rolls into bake I wiped my hands and pushed my way through the swinging doors. "Hey there big brother!" I stopped in shock as I spotted not just Mikey but the whole damn clan! I mean there was Mikey, Johnny, Whitey and little sister Sarah. I stood with my jaw hanging as I counted heads. There were the brothers, their spouses and kids, all standing just outside my galley. Twenty-seven McHards from all over and I was in shock. My jaw dropped further when a voice I had never thought to hear from again spoke up. Pushing her way past tall and short cousins, brothers, sister in laws, nieces and nephews was the grand dame of the clan, Mary Margaret Gillcrest McHard, She had not left the homestead for as long as I could remember. Told me when I went off to space that I was disowned. "Grandma Mary?" She came toward me and took my hands. Looking me up and down, she shook her head and sighed. "Thirty years boy. Thirty years and you never come back and visit?" I tried to say something but my jaw just flapped. She grinned and wrapped her arms about me and hugged me like I was still the little boy at her knee. "Lord above we missed you, boyo. So show me this kitchen I have heard so much about." I let her lead me about just like I had when I was a sprattling and she was the head of the homestead. She had been pushing one hundred back then and I never expected to see her again once I left home. I mean yeah we are a long-lived bunch but she was well past the age that put you in the dirt. She was still spry, I could tell by her step. Yes she leaned on a cane but she should have been in a rocking chair on a porch back home, not stomping her way across the deck to my kitchen. I managed to catch up and open the doors to my sanctum sanctorum before she bustled through. I waved off the rest of the clan, leaving them in the hands of my busboys to get settled down around the tables. Okay might not have been wise to leave my clan to mingle with the incoming space station staff but what was I do to? Grandma Mary stepped through and paused as she took in the gleaming palace of culinary delights I had put together over the years of working on the station. She smiled and then went from place to place, checking a pot here, nodding at the ovens there. I was both proud and nervous. This one tiny woman had taught me the basics of my craft so many years ago. What would she think of the equipment that was far from what she used back home. After a long moment she turned and smiled. "My boy, you have done well haven't ye?" She gestured at the simmering pots and nodded. "Everything is nearly ready isn't it?" She started toward my quarters to take a look. See I have everything in one place. Kitchen, hydroponics and of course my sleeping space are all together. I quickly stepped past her and scooped up a few things, tossing them into a drawer. I really didn't need my old grandmother catching sight of those things! She smiled at me with a twinkle in her eyes and then sniffed and stepped around me to twitch the covering on my bed. "About how I remember." She fingered the old pillow on my bed with a sad smile before looking up at me. "You kept it still?" I nodded silently and she pulled me down for a hug and a soft few words. "She would have loved being here." She then headed back out. See that pillow belonged to the reason I left old Earth. Not something I want to think about or go back into so I followed her. She bustled all the relatives out of my kitchen and was chatting with my sou chef. What you think I do everything in a station this size? I have a whole battery of assistants, most of who were off station for the holiday. When we are slow I let them go off to visit their families of course. Unlike my leafy busboy, Crystal was not really flexible about going places. Ya see when I say her name is Crystal that is just what I call her. Her name is unpronounceable by us fleshies but she did not care. She somehow ended up with a palate that matched what most of us fleshie types preferred. Well she and Grandmother Mary Margaret were talking about recipes and arguing over the best spice to use. I was torn between adding my two cents and the rest of the work I needed to do when Hershel called out from the dinning room. "Mic! Need you!" Sighing I rushed out to the dinning room and shook my head. My brother Mickey was juggling the good dishes and Hershel was trying to snatch them out of the air. See Hershel believes if one dish gets damaged I might cook him up for dinner. Now it might have something with a threat I made a while back but really I wouldn't. It might have been a lifetime since I yelled at him but my little brother paused like I wanted him to. "MIKEY HCHARD ENOUGH!" "Aw come on big brother." I would swear the boy hadn't changed in all the time I had been gone. Somehow I managed to get the family settled at a table off to the side, the regulars set at their tables and the food was brought out. Like any chef I was the last one to the table and there were only a few rolls tossed and my relatives managed to not insult the crew of the station. All in all I was relieved, that is until Grandma Mary Margaret tapped her knife on her glass and the room actually grew quite. She smiled as she stood and looked about the dinning hall. "I am sure all of you here would like to know why the McHard Clan descended on your little Thanksgiving dinner." There were a lot of yeahs and sures and I held my breath. Even if I was embarrassed I was intrigued. "Commander Frank Ernest McHard is the eldest son of my son departed, Derek. As such he is the eldest heir of the Clan McHard. When he left the homestead it was decided to let him find his place in the universe but now that he has," she turned to face me. "The entire clan has picked up and moved to be with the new head of Clan McHard." There were cheers from my brothers, cousins, nieces and nephews but I just blinked. "Head?" I must have been hearing things. By leaving Earth I had given up any chance of being what I didn't want to be. I can tell you right at that moment I must have panicked because I started mumbling about finding a rock to hide on. There was no way my entire family could be coming here. There was just not anyplace to put them. As I started to move back to my sanctuary I felt a hand on my arm. Crystal, Hershel and the rest of my team all smiled and kept me in place. Crystal pulled me down to her and whispered in my ear. "Don't worry boss, they all ready have quarters and jobs." I had to deal with all that silly backslapping and congrats from family and friends. It was so embarrassing and just to top it all off Grandma Mary Margaret started in on showing me pictures of girls she had vetted to be the new clan head mistress. See what happens when the family comes to dinner? Wonder if I can find a ship heading deeper into the Black?

Mille FeuillesSimone “If I do not choose, that is still a choice.” – Jean Paul Sartre The girl removed her frosting-smeared apron and tossed it in the laundry basket near the door of the kitchen. In the glaring fluorescent light, the stainless sinks and countertops glinted under a thick coating of flour. She’d made a real disaster for the cleaning crew, as usual, in her cluttered workstation. But the results had been well worth it. The patrons, jaded though they were with her usual delectable confections, had proclaimed the pumpkin mille feuille stupendous, her best dessert ever. She had to agree. The delicate buttery layers of crisp pastry sandwiched cinnamon and pumpkin cream. She always made pastry from scratch. Yes, it was tedious, but the myriad thin sheets were well worth the effort. Mille feuilles. Thousand leaves. It seemed like the perfect dessert for that awkward time between Halloween and Thanksgiving; deep autumn, with nothing further to recommend itself. Too late for summer days. Too early for Christmas trees. The world seemed poised on the edge, holding its breath in anticipation of the holiday rush, which would start in two weeks. But not yet. She scrubbed her hands at the washing station. The white porcelain sink contrasted with the silver room. Through the open window, curious customers could peer at her as she whipped cream or piped pâte à choux. She smiled. Life as a pastry chef was exactly what she had always dreamed. Then her smile faded as she remembered. She dried her hands and skidded a bit as she traversed a slippery layer of flour on the tile floor to the door that separated the kitchen from the break room. She kicked off her pale blue paper booties and dropped them in the trash. Once again they had failed to protect her black sneakers from white smears. Today a large orange glob had been added to the mess. She sighed. Someday she would have to go out and buy some nice shoes, and just keep these for work. But then, she rarely went out, so was it really necessary to spend her hard-earned money on something she would rarely wear? She didn’t know. And she didn’t feel like deciding, so she walked across the break room, gathering up her coat. She slipped it on, zipping it up to her chin and pulling the hood over her head. Then she punched out at the little clock by the door and headed out into the street. Immediately she was set upon by a chilly wind. It gusted down the alley carrying with it a swirl of dry leaves and fragments, in their autumn shades of scarlet, pumpkin, rust, and gold. There was almost no green left, except for one stout spruce on the corner of Main and St. Charles Streets. From here she couldn’t see it, but the breeze carried its spicy aroma, along with the pleasant tang of the leaves themselves. Another gust sent them dancing past her again, and several plastered themselves to her jacket and wound their way into her thin blond hair, tangling with the ends and embedding themselves there. She fought the wind to the edge of the alley and peeked out between the tawny brick buildings. Perfect. No traffic. One of the best parts of her job was the hours. Yes, she had to be at work by 4:00am, but she got out at 1:00. The lunch crowd had returned to their cubicles and offices. The school pickup rush had not begun. The streets were so quiet she could hear the wind whispering through the nearly bare branches of the oaks and maples that lined Main Street. Not a car in sight. She hurried between a pretentious SUV and a battered station wagon parked along the curb and crossed. Only two blocks to the market. The wind blew sideways, gusting out between the buildings and trying to knock her first into a plate glass window, then into a rank, musty-smelling alleyway. At last she reached the relative shelter of the market. This was the last Saturday the farmers would be meeting to sell their produce. After all, they were down to the squash and the last of the apples. Nothing more would be grown until the spring strawberries. By the end of next week, the wide open structure would be filled with Christmas trees, eight weeks ahead of the holiday. As the girl had expected, most of the vendors had left at noon, driven away by the icy wind, or by their empty crates. Only a few intrepid, desperate souls stood shivering, trying to stay warm with earmuffs and cups of tepid coffee. She found a Vietnamese man in a striped scarf with a lovely assortment of squashes and picked out a chubby butternut. The other vendors had more of the same, but in poorer condition. Content with her meager purchase, she walked through the market and out the other end, leaving the shelter of the white-trimmed green awning and emerging in the blustery street. More leaves pelted her as she continued. In another block, businesses gave way to condominiums. Then condos changed to small apartment buildings in the shells of decaying mansions. Two more blocks and she reached a small residential neighborhood. Most of the homes were single story, painted in soft earth tones, with mature trees in the tidy yards. From one naked birch, a big black crow greeted her with a raucous squawk, preening his shiny feathers. “Kelsey, hello.” The hood muffled the sound. She almost didn’t hear the soft greeting. It barely registered on her consciousness. She turned slowly, taking in medium brown hair, ruffling in the November wind, friendly cocoa colored eyes with little crinkles in the corners, and a shy smile. “Hello, Adam.” “It sure is... cold out here,” he began, smiling again, this time in deprecation of his lame greeting. “Yes,” Kelsey agreed. “I heard about your grandmother. I’m sorry.” “Oh. Well, yes.” Kelsey hated those kinds of statements. She never knew how to respond. “Would you like to step inside?” He indicated the door of his sky blue rambler. “I have some coffee.” “Some other time, Adam,” Kelsey replied. His face fell. She turned and walked to her own door; tan against the dark brown paint, fumbling with the key. Inside was blessedly warm. New double-paned windows had been Kelsey’s first purchase with the life insurance money. She scanned the living room and pondered what would be next. The room was almost suffocatingly cozy, with a pale rose sofa protected by a plastic slipcover. Though three decades out of date, it was in perfect condition. As were the soft tan recliners. The three seats flanked a brass fireplace in a blond brick wall. The other walls were papered in roses, and paintings of the flowers crowded the walls. Grandma Rose had, perhaps, been a bit of an egomaniac. This was no living space for a twenty-seven year old single woman. She should gut it. Replace everything except the knotty pine floor. Strip the paper and paint the walls. Replace the fussy old lady furniture with something sleek. Not today. She picked several dead leaves from her clothing and hair, hung her coat in the closet, and walked through the living room into the kitchen. This was her sanctuary. While the dated wallpaper and perfectly preserved Formica still spoke of decades past, the cabinets had been redone and the appliances were new. She set her purchase beside the sink and pulled out a heavy stock pot from a lower cabinet. She filled the pot with homemade chicken broth from her stash in the refrigerator and retrieved her cutting board from the dish drainer. A deadly-looking knife was pressed into service and the squash was quickly reduced to chunks, which she placed with the broth in the pot. Kelsey wondered as she worked why so many people complained about cooking for one. She liked it. There were no other opinions to consider. She ate only what she liked and wanted, and what she liked best was to buy fresh, seasonal things and experiment. Like the pastries today. They would taste all wrong in July, when everyone craved berries. But now, in deep fall, they had been perfect. Berries would be wrong. Kelsey stirred her squash in broth and added some pepper and nutmeg. She considered rice, but decided against it. Not today. Why muddy the smooth texture and pure flavor of the squash with extras? She opened a different lower cabinet and perused her wine options, eventually selecting a Cabernet Sauvignon. Uncorking the bottle, she poured herself a glass of the rich burgundy liquid and took a seat in one of the recliners, retrieving a book from the wooden table beside. She’d been working on Jane Eyre. Again. And she let the beauty of the prose and the faint sweetness of the wine wash over her. The book failed to hold her interest today. Too quiet. For her whole life she’d been reading to the clicking of knitting needles. A quick glance around the room showed just a fraction of her late grandmother’s prolific hobby. Pillows; round and square, in shades of deep pink, adorned both ends of the sofa. Knitted throws hung on the back of every chair. Grandma Rose had never taught Kelsey to knit. She’d taught her to cook, had raised her from infancy, but had never instilled her favorite hobby in her granddaughter and only surviving relative. How odd that suddenly seemed. Maybe Kelsey could go down to the library and check out a book. Teach herself. But not today. It was too cold and windy. The timer in the kitchen sounded a soft chime, and she set aside her book, carrying her glass back in with her. She took another sip and pulled out her immersion blender, rendering the softened chunks of squash into a smooth purée. She added a dash of cream and took a taste. Perfect. Turning the heat to its lowest setting, she pulled out a loaf of homemade bread and sliced it, heating it gently in her toaster oven. She had enough soup for two. Maybe she should walk across the street and knock on Adam’s door. Grandma Rose would approve. She’d been talking about that nice young man for months, ever since he’d moved in. Her colleagues would approve also, though there would be more than soup expected in that invitation. She shook her head. Kelsey didn’t know what to make of Adam. He seemed nice, but awkward. Shy. And so was she. They would probably sit in uncomfortable silence occasionally broken by inane questions about the weather, and comments on the food. “Well, Kelsey, if you’re not interested, you should tell him.” The sound of her own voice startled her a little. She pulled out a bowl and ladled in some soup, picked up the slices of hot bread, and returned to the living room. She didn’t feel up to the silence in the kitchen, so she placed her food on a tray and clicked on the boxy silver television in the corner. She switched channels between bites but found nothing to engage her. Eventually she turned it off and tried again to read, without success. By this time, night had fallen, though the clock showed an early hour. Well, no matter. She worked early. She could go to bed now. It took Kelsey another hour to clean the kitchen, package up the soup, and brush her teeth. At last, she went to her room. Perhaps, since Grandma Rose had left her the house, she could move into the master suite? No. That was Grandma’s room. Kelsey would never feel right in there. And she was comfortable in her little space; her twin bed with its purple satin bedspread, her laden bookshelf, her violet area rug on the pale pine floor. This was all Kelsey, and she needed nothing more. The wind rattled the windows, blowing the leaves against the side of the house. Kelsey could hear them as they crumbled to powder on impact. As she drifted in the space between awake and asleep, she thought again about Adam. Would she tell him she wasn’t interested, or invite him to dinner? She really did need to decide what she wanted at least... Kelsey closed her eyes. Not today.

Thankful...Right?Ceil(Please note: this is more about being thankful instead of it being about Thanksgiving but since Thanksgiving is around the corner, the theme is appropriate).Everyday she would put dog food in the food bowl and water in the water bowl. Then she would fix herself something in the morning.She would lean on the counter, glass in hand and wait until the microwave rung.She, Persephone, knew that Thanksgiving was coming soon. She sighed. She was thankful for her mind...although it was becoming broken from the recent debacle.She was thankful for walking...but sometimes she would think of her when she went out.The 'her' in reference is a nine week old puppy that ran away. Persephone wanted--no, needed--her to come home. Shimotsuki was her name. At first Persephone didn't like her until the day she came home and opened the door to let Shimotsuki go out to use the bathroom.The gate was open A truck drove byNo.Persephone knew Shimotsuki the German Shepherd would find her way home. She always did this.Thanksgiving was coming. Persephone was thankful Shimotsuki came home alive and well.Shimotsuki isn't here now but Persephone acts like she is here.By doing this, Persephone hopes to tell the universe and the God that Be to guide her puppy home. Not once can she let negativity sway her.Thanksgiving was coming. It was around the corner, peeking in in her to see if she was thankful.Persephone and Shimotsuki were ready and thankful to live.Persephone is thankful that Shimotsuki is right beside her.Must stay positive...~~~Author Notes: I was listening to My Love by Namie Amuro twice when I wrote this. Shimotsuki is the name of my favorite singer, Haruka Shimotsuki.